"Australian, Bob Barnard, is the cleanest and most cliche free cornet player I have ever heard."

So wrote the reviewer of the Allegheny Jazz Society (Pennsylvania USA). In an area where the best jazz musicians in the world are regularly heard that is some praise indeed.

His style has been compared favourably by critics to the likes of Louis Armstrong, Bobby Hackett and Billy Butterfield among others. But as this review suggests he has reached a point where he plays in a pure and natural style that comparisons are perhaps not so appropriate.

To ask him about his style one finds out that he does not regard himself as a trad or old fashioned player. He says he plays a style that began with Louis Armstrong "It's a classic style, if you like, that comes up through Bunny Berigan, Bobby Hackett, Ruby Braff and Warren Vache." Barnard's is the perfect mainstream style, a cross between the lyricism and drive that the trumpet can achieve.

In the Melbourne Age Adrian Jackson asked him how his playing has changed over the years. "It has changed, but very gradually. I'm a bit more sophisticated in my outlook, and in my playing. But it's still basically me. The way I play is the way I play ... Maybe others are in a better position to judge..."

Barnard is presented by jazz festivals and clubs all over the world and the response is seldom less than enthusiastic. Reviews are seldom less than rave, from the Melbourne Age to the El Mercurio (Santiago, Chile), from the Sydney Morning Herald (Australia) to the Jazz Journal International or Rapport (Los Angeles).

Making his first record at the age of sixteen, Bob was already recognized as one of Australia's most outstanding jazz players before he was twenty years old. Since that time he has become an icon of Australian jazz and has probably made more of an impression internationally than anyone in his field.

He has played successfully on most of the major [and minor] jazz festivals of the world both with his own bands and as a featured artist with international all star line ups.

Barnard has also recorded with top US jazz artists over the years including Wild Bill Davison, Milt Hinton, Peanuts Hucko, Dan Barrett, Ken Peplowski, Bob Wilber, Warren Vache, Ralph Sutton, Dick Wellstood, Jim Galloway and many more.

Other musicians he has featured with include well known British players such as Humphrey Lyttleton, Roy Williams, Kenny Ball, Brian Lemon, and Acker Bilk to mention a few. He's also been the featured artist numerous times at London's Ronnie Scott's, one of the world's best known jazz clubs.

At this stage of his career Bob enjoys the respect and admiration of some of the top jazz players of the world as well as critics and audiences. Dr Clement Semmler, a pioneer of Australian jazz broadcasting wrote in The Bulletin (August 28, 1990) "Barnard rightly enjoys the reputation as one of the best mainstream trumpeters in the world."

In Tasmania, critic Steve Robertson called him "the perfect jazz musician."

In the Denver Post (Colorado, USA) he was referred to as "the great Australian trumpet player Bob Barnard... a rich toned revelation, swinging like mad..." and praised for ''an a Capella chorus of improvised perfection".